Tag Archives: L. Wayne Ashley

Recent years have proven challenging for Houston’s incredible Arts Scene. After KUHF’s Award-Winning program The Front Row closed its doors in 2013, the city’s diverse collection of artists and musicians lost one of their greatest champions. In the years since, Houstonians have been wondering what will become of the once robust local music and arts coverage that was offered on public radio.

Past live performance from KUHF’s The Front Row featuring members of the Houston Ebony Music Society, 2012. Performers are DuWayne Davis, Adavion Wayne, Wayne Ashley and Leon Turner with Dr. John Cornelius at the piano.

Even with excellent intermittent feature stories from the great folks at Houston Public Media’s Houston Matters and the dedicated work of Arts and Culture reporter Amy Bishop and TV8 program Arts InSight, Houston Arts have dearly missed the programming options and connectivity that our former program schedule provided, and have been left wondering if there will ever be additional options.

Luckily with 2017, part of that open question is getting answered, as Houston Public Media premieres a new program dedicated to classical music in the area. Here’s more from Clifford Pugh of CultureMap…

The first episode features Mercury‘s performance of Beethoven’s Symphony No. 9 in D Minor, also known as the “Choral” Symphony, from May 2016, along with commentary and details about the chamber orchestra’s upcoming performance from Houston Public Media classical host and producer Joshua Zinn.

[…]

Other classical groups that will be featured during the first season are KINETIC, Chamber Music Houston, DaCamera, Ars Lyrica, Houston Early Music, Context, Musiqa, Bach Society, Houston Chamber Choir, River Oaks Chamber Orchestra, and St. Cecilia Chamber Music Society. The length of each show varies according to the concert performance; most shows will run between one and two hours.

Like other HPM program offerings, each episode of Encore Houston is also available via podcast, so if you’ve missed the debut, you can always go back and check out the previous shows. Beyond listening, you can also show your support for Encore Houston (and any possibilities of future arts coverage) by posting about the program on social media. Host and producer Joshua Zinn is on Twitter as @HPMZinn, and though there’s no Facebook page for the specific show yet, you can always like the Houston Public Media page and like/comment on posts about the new show.

After a noticeable drought of music and arts coverage, it’s great to see those resources slowly reforming in the community. Encore, indeed!

Houston’s LyondellBasell refinery’s management turned off an advance warning system near the front gates of the plant, where striking USW workers walk the picket line. PDiddie at Brains and Eggs says that if this is how they demonstrate their concerns for worker safety, it’s no wonder they won’t end a work stoppage despite the national settlement.

Rafael McDonnell recalls a meeting and interview he had with anti-gay pastor Flip Benham 20 years ago.

Raise Your Hand Texas testifies that an A-F grading system for schools and school districts is a bad idea.

(This week’s feature photo is the 1903 Tyrell Public Library in Beaumont, Texas. The 112 year old building was originally constructed for the First Baptist Church of Beaumont. Photo credit: L. Wayne Ashley)

Texas Leftist kicked off the 84th Legislative Session with a new blog series. Big Government Texas is a catalogue of the endless hypocrisy waged from Texas’ TEApublican CONservative leaders. Check out Part 1 and Part 2 of the series.

TransGriot and HOUEquality have news roundups on the Houston Equal Rights Ordinance and the so far failed effort to put an item on the ballot to repeal it.

Lone Star Q lists the 63 Texas legislators that signed on to the Texas Conservative Coalition brief in the same sex marriage appeal, in which they drag out more insulting and discredited arguments to support those made by AG Greg Abbott.